May 23, 2010

Last year I wrote a little post about our music tree in the back yard. The kids had a lot of fun with it, but when it got to the rainy season here I brought in the musical bits, and for several months, the tree sat musicless and leafless in a soupy mud pit.Fast forward a few months and the rain has stopped being so relentless, but when I went out to reinstate the music tree, I found that this dinky little apple tree that had never given us more than about five apples in total, was absolutely covered in tiny apples this year! Whoooo! I didn't want to put all the chimes back on and have the kids smacking all the growing apples with wooden spoons though. Dilema!A short while ago Jenny posted about "music walls" and "banging posts" on her blog "Let the Children Play". She gave some great links to a bunch of different ones that people had made. You can find that post here.

Our landlord is in negotiations with our neighbour to replace a rotting fence between us, so there is no problem bashing a ton of nails into it over the summer. Long story short... here's our music wall... Broken xylophone, the old wind chimes and tambourines from the music tree, some bowls, pans and a load of sticks (wooden spoons or beads on wire sticks), plus a couple of the wire shelves from an old refridgerator that a neighbour was disposing of. Lots of clangy bangy goodness. All of the hardware used to fix stuff to the fence was lurking in the garage, so this didn't cost us anything to do. I honestly have no idea what these weird things that the chimes are hanging from are meant to be for. Something to do with curtains maybe? To hang the wooden spoons up I used a bit of electrical tape to stick a length of electrical tie in a loop from the end.I actually like this much better than the tree, but I can't put my finger on why. Maybe it's having it all laid out like a giant instrument, rather than the randomness of the tree, but then I did like the randomness of the tree. Maybe it's just that it's something new. I'm always keen for change afterall. Here's the littlest lass to give you a demo...

Thanks Jenny for pointing us to all that lovely inspiration in your blog post!

Sorry to any of you that subscribe to Filth Wizardry and got a couple of non existant posts in your RSS feed yesterday. Blame my trigger happy keyboard short cutting while I was trying to consolidate all the unpublished posts I have lurking back here! Ooops, sorry! As the title of the non existent post said "Mmm, I love people" and I do, but all of that has been crammed into another post with some other stuff now, so be patient :) My mate is on the verge of labour with her fourth baby, so I will have a house full of children while she's in the hospital. My cunning plan is to hang them upsidedown from the ceiling like bats to fit them all in the bedroom overnight ;) Maybe a more reasonable solution would be to build a massive den in the livingroom.

Thank you for the lovely mention :) I loved your music tree, but I LOVE your banging wall - especially that it is so spread out and the kids could move up and down creating a whole magnificient concert of sound! Nifty idea with the individual pieces of the xylophone too.

Wow! Can you please come and make a music wall at my house- Pleease!! Awesome. It reminds me of a little music station at our science center- it's one of the first places my children run to. Hmm. I'll have to think about how I can make somethingn like this in our backyard. I am inspired- again- from your blog!!

Wow! Can you please come and make a music wall at my house- Pleease!! Awesome. It reminds me of a little music station at our science center- it's one of the first places my children run to. Hmm. I'll have to think about how I can make somethingn like this in our backyard. I am inspired- again- from your blog!!

Okay, so the music tree was already awesome, but your music wall is world class! Our own "sound garden" is only made from PVC pipe and is therefore rather temporary. I do have a stretch of fencing, however, that has nothing on it but paint . . . Thanks for your brilliance, yet again!

I'm giving you a blog award. I know you're not into the rules of blog awards and that's A-ok with me! Pass it on if you have the time or inclination. Shout out to you on my blog at:http://delilahsmomma.blogspot.com/2010/05/blog-award.html

LOVE the music wall. Would it be completely insane to do that IN the house in the basement?!?!?

janimal: Thanks for the awardy doodad. I'll say thanks proparly when I get together a post with some examples of other people's projects that they have tried from here :)

A couple of you have suggested that our wee apple tree may have been rewarding us for months of preschooler seranading. It's either that, or the fact that the "rainy season" has gone on for about two months longer than it usually does ;) (feels like home for me though when it pours)

Also, about the neighbours... They are really nice. Have got older kids who play basket ball a lot right near the house, which makes about as much noise as the music wall. They don't seem to mind the intermitant music wall noise either. It's not like we're blasting Rage Against the Machine at each other during the night ;)

I'm creating a resource folder for my Diploma of Children's Services, and would love love love to include this music wall. I'd love to use the photos in my folder. Please let me know if this is ok :)ThanksKatie

I am soooooo using this idea! We live on acreage so my daughter can play to heart's content and this is a fantastic idea. You are such a creative spirit and you're daughter showed such great style playing...esply at the end, she was a joy to watch!

I was amazed by your music wall. I used your music wall photos in my blog writing about different wall ideas. I hope that is ok, as I referred to your website. Please let me know if this is ok with you.

Beautiful! Will share your link with many, I found it on The Children's Music Network listserve. I've seen things like this at children's museums but you've shown us how to use common household things, hardware gadgets and recycled instruments/stuff in a more creative and less costly way. Thank you!

My neighbor did complain about our music "garden", but she is grumpy about children in general. So I paid attention to how long the children actually play the instruments and the time of day and it is a reasonable amount of time. We put an upside down metal garbage can in our music garden. I like that this is a wall, all spread out. Our pan lids are hung on our fort and a piece of sheet metal is attached to another spot (within a wood frame with rounded corners, of course). Thanks for sharing. I LOVE the xylophone.

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Fangletronics

The man that I am affiliated with also has a blog. He loves to make stuff with and for our kids as well. His domain is more in the realms of electronics, but he makes other stuff too. Check out his electronic fangling over at Fangletronics.